My father thereupon mounted the hustings (he was nine feet tall and looked like a moose without antlers) and escorted me to my room to contemplate in cakeless solitude the meaning of a word new to me: “selfish.” To me then, and to Daffy Duck now, “selfish” means “honest but antisocial”; “unselfish” means “socially acceptable but often dishonest.” We all want the whole cake, but, unlike Daffy and at least one six-year-old boy, the coward in the rest of us keeps the Daffy Duck, the small boy in us, under control.
“You may cut as large a piece as you want” is a dangerous euphemism. There is a prescribed wedge on every birthday cake that is completely and exactly surrounded by corporal punishment. Exceeding these limits by even a thousandth of an inch brands one as “selfish.” From my seventh birthday on, I learned to approach with judgment sharper than a razor’s edge this line, without cutting the “un” from “unselfish” to “selfish.” I learned very little about social morality but a great deal about survival, and this, after all, is what Daffy Duck is all about.
“Of all the characters you have worked with, do you have a favorite?”
I’ve been told that long lists tend to cause readers’ eyes to glaze over, but the astonishing number of characters I have worked with must be inserted somewhere. It might as well be here.
Consider (and these are not all, by any means):
No. No favorites. But of all that motley crew there is one with whom I most clearly associate and whose behavior I most clearly recognize and for whom I have the greatest affinity and understanding. That, of course, is Daffy Duck.
Final try: ROBIN HOOD DAFFY (1958)
Bugs Bunny is an inspiration. How could I fail to admire a character who is equal parts Rex Harrison, D’Artagnan, and Dorothy Parker, packed into a graceful rabbit skin? Daffy is recognition, as is the Coyote.
To quote Richard Thompson (Film Comment, January–February 1975): “How do Bugs and Daffy differ? Bugs is a winner and Daffy is a loser” (just like Chaplin, Keaton, Laurel and Hardy, Richard Pryor, and Woody Allen, C.J.). “In these films [Rabbit Fire; Duck! Rabbit! Duck!; Rabbit Seasoning] we have the clearest definition of general roles: Elmer never knows what’s going on; Bugs always knows what’s going on and is in control of events; Daffy is bright enough to understand how to be in control, but he never quite makes it. Both Bugs and Daffy are talkers, but Daffy talks too much—Daffy’s vanity is disastrous. Bugs stands back from a situation, analyzes it, and makes his move; Daffy becomes emotionally involved, loses his distance, and blows it. He’s stuck with a one-track mind which fixes on only one facet of the problem and loses sight of the larger pattern. Bugs is a strong, more traditional American hero—Daffy is much more complicated. He’s a coward, he claims, but a live coward—he feels a preemptive necessity to set someone else (Bugs) up for the destruction he knows is stalking him.”
“That is a rabbit!”: RABBIT SEASONING (1952)
In other words, ask not for whom the bell tolls; if I can help it, it tolls for thee.
How am I like Daffy Duck? Let me count the ways:
• Daffy rushes in and fears to tread at the same time.
• “Cowardice,” says Daffy, “is its own reward.”
• D. Duck Motto: “Shoot a rabbit; save a duck.”
• “Ducks are an endangered species; especially me.”
• “It is far better to be dethpicable than to be dead.”
• “Honesty is the best policy—when everything else fails.”
• “I’m different from other people, pain hurts me.”
• “If you can’t get a half-loaf, take a whole loaf; a whole loaf is better than nothing.”
ROBIN HOOD DAFFY (1958)
To sum up: Daffy gallantly and publicly represents all the character traits that the rest of us try to keep subdued. A social amenity to Daffy Duck is simply an unfair block to his desires. To desire, in Daffy’s rationale, is to need—as it was to me at six; to need is to acquire, and acquisition is the essence of living. To achieve his ends, he cheerfully and always rationally chews up moral codes by the yard. His rationality may, however, do him in, as in Rabbit Seasoning:
BUGS: (To Elmer) Do you want to shoot him now or wait till you get home.
DAFFY: (Protesting) He doesn’t have to shoot me now! (To Elmer) Wait till you get home.
ELMER: All wight.
Off arm-in-arm they go to the distant cabin, the door closes; hesitate; the cabin windows light up to the sound of a distant gunshot; hesitate; the cabin door opens to the sound of trap drums; a battered Daffy trudges into the foreground, up to Bugs, grasps him firmly by the neck fur, glares at the undisturbed Bugs.
DAFFY: You’re dethpicable!!
Daffy is just like all of us, only more so. Perhaps that’s why we find him so appealing.
DEDUCE, YOU SAY (1956)
Unused dialogue—Daffy conversing with “J.L.” (Warner): THE SCARLET PUMPERNICKEL (1950)
Every great comedian makes himself available to his audience. That is, the traits that define his personality the audience must be able to recognize in themselves—even though, as in the case of Daffy or Bugs, they do not have the courage to exercise them.
“For shame, Doc, shooting a rabbit with an elephant gun”: RABBIT FIRE (1951)
I think Daffy wins our admiration for his courage—a courage we probably lack—but we take pride in our wisdom in not pushing in where Daffy fails. We know we are wiser than Daffy, and we can laugh at his foolish failures, but lurking beneath this recognition is a sneaking admiration for his courage.
I know of no great lasting comedian who was not a loser. I know of no beloved comedian or actor
